Tour trivia question
 

Hi,
need help on 1 or 2 Tour history questions that I can't find using the usual sources.
1. Who's the oldest rider to make his debut in the Tour post-war? (I know a 50 year old rode the 1904 tour.)
2. What country has had the most total Tour participations (ridersxstarts) without ever making the final podium?

anyone have a suggestion where to look?
thanks,
Greg

If you are willing to do the brute force yourself I'd try:

http://translate.google.com/translat...lr%3D%26sa%3DN

This is the page I have bookmarked, and it brings up a page not found, but you can navigate from it. And get all the information you need. Or jsut search for memoire-du-cyclisme in Google and use the translate option (unless you speak French).

The site is excellent. A few years ago I posed the question here "Which riders won the TDF on their first Entry"? Many here came up with wrong answers because they foolishly trusted the official TFD site, which it turns otu only listed finishers and several riders in hte early years won the first time they finished (but not the first time they started).

I'll bet the brute force will work for most participants without a podium! I'd first make a list of countries that had a Podium placement, then check the years with National Teams. That will give you ther candidates. I believe one of the French posetions in Africa had a team at least once. Oh and from this site:
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/veloarc...aces/index.htm
I was able to find out that the best English finisher up to 2001 was Robert Millar in 1984. I checked and no podiums since then. My money is on England!

Yes England for sure. No one close unless you count the Basques as a seperate country, and I'd not be surprised if Baha or some other French or Spanish podium finisher is Basque. Columbia came to mind as a possibility, but because I saw it in the podium placing for 1988.

Austria was likely running second, until Bernard Kohl placed 3rd in 2008.

England by a mile.

Excellent, thanks for the help Keith!

Robert Millar is Scottish not English.

My money is on Great Britain.

another one for you guys now that the full start list is out - where to look for the 3 oldest/3 youngest starters in this year's race? and a list of which starters are racing their first Tour?
Thanks, Greg

OK, I'm a total nerd with too much time on my hands... (it's adjusted for this year's starters)
30 countries have participated without ever making the final podium
riders total participations
Great Britain 62 167
Austria 26 66
Norway 12 45
Ukraine 10 41
Slovenia 12 24
Czech R. 9 22
Estonia 4 21
New Zealand 8 19
Canada 6 19
Algeria 5 12
Mexico 2 11
Belarus 5 10
USSR 6 9
Venezuela 4 9
Latvia 3 9
S.Africa 2 9
Uzbekistan 2 9
Yugoslavia 6 8
Brazil 5 7
Japan 4 6
Finland 3 6
Romania 4 4
Moroco 2 4
Argentina 1 3
Hungary 1 3
Slovakia 1 3
Moldavia 2 2
Tunisia 1 2
Costa Rica 1 1
Croatia 1 1

The letour.fr database will tell you there are only 5 Canadian Tour riders but they've put Pierre Gachon in with the Brits. I moved him.

and obviously Austria's 1 podium was erased

letour.fr also lists a Kenyan Froome but he rode on a British license.

doh! take Austria off the list, they had a podium in '57.